I am on a reading roll at the moment with lots of goodies coming my way, nearly all new to me and authors I would not have read if they had not arrived through my letterbox, so once again I am grateful to all those lovely publishers who have faith in me and send me books.
The First Wife - Emily Barr
Now this I would not have chosen if I had been browsing in a bookshop and the reason for this is yet another cover with another headless woman on it it a red dress. That makes two this month in my reading. I think the publishers really need to realise that we are all fed up with headless women - understandable if they are on the front of historical novels and, particularly, in the Tudor period because that is how a lot of them ended up, but enough is enough.This kind of cover can diminish the content of the book which would be a shame as this story was very good indeed.
Lily Button, abandoned by her parents and brought up by her grandparents who have recently died, finds that not only does she have nobody in the world, she also has no money as the cottage where they lived is heavily mortgaged and debts have to be paid. She is friendless as she has spent the last few years being their main carer and is frightened by the world in which she now finds herself. Almost suicidal she is rescued by Al from jumping off the harbour bridge and he tells her his story and how he had grown up in foster care, ran away, lived in hostels and on the streets and was helped by an old school teacher who took him in and looked after him. He finds Lily a place to stay and she gets a cleaning job at the house of a local celebrity couple, glamorous and exciting. Harry and Sarah Summers appear to have the perfect life and yet, when on holiday in Barcelona, Sarah slips away from her sleeping husband and throws herself into the sea.
After Sarah's death Lily finds herself drawn to Harry as he turns the full force of his charm her way. For the first time in her life she is adored and loved and secure but as their wedding date draws nearer and she realises that things are not what they seem, Lily decides to take a trip to Barcelona to find out what really happened on that ill fated trip. She is in for a nasty shock.
The First Wife is a real page turner and I could not put it down and the ending gripping and full of tension. All the characters are well drawn and believable and there is a second thread running alongside the story of Lily, that of Jack Baker in New Zealand who decides to forge a new life for himself after he finds his wife is cheating on him. He and Lily meet up in difficult circumstances and are both together when the final twist of the book is revealed which had been hinted at, but was still a surprise when revealed.
A really good exciting read and I am now going to hunt out Emily Barr's other books as I enjoyed this one so much.
Please note that this particular edition doesn't appear to be available until September but Amazon are showing others available now so if you want to read this title, and I hope you do, then check this out
It had to be You - David Nobbs
This is my second goodie and another book that had me totally engrossed and unable to leave my sofa until finished.
James Hollinghurst is driving to a meeting with the American head of Globpack and he is afraid he might be losing his job.
"Globpack! How had they come up with that? He had inherited a bit of his dad's artistic taste and he found it hard to believe that a career that had begun in the Basingstoke Box Company had led him, inexorably, to being employed by a firm called Globpack"
While this is going on his wife, Deborah, is driving to a rendezvous with a Man in a White Linen Suit who is hoping that after their lunch they will retire to the room he has booked in the hotel.
She never arrives. Deborah is killed in a collision on her way to her prospective lover and everything changes.
James and Deborah have been married a long time and, while still happy, their lives had inevitably settled into a routine and James has had a mistress, Helen, for several years. OK they both knew that he would never leave Deborah, but now she has gone, what does he do? Is there a formula for telling one's mistress that your wife is dead? "Silence. Words churning through her mind. Thoughts and emotions churning uncontrollably. No social formula in which to clothe her naked feelings. He senses it all, and he felt for her. He knew what it was like"
When a tragedy occurs such as this family relationships and tensions come to the fore. James has always felt inferior to his elder brother Charles, a world famous concert pianist, and his younger brother Philip has suffered in the same way. James's daughter Charlotte has not spoken to her parents for five years and he doesn't know why; his son Max is working in forestry in Canada. All these people have to be told.
I know David Nobbs from his TV work as a scriptwriter and I am ashamed to say that this is his 18th novel and yet it is the first one I have read - it won't be the last now that I have discovered him. One of his hit series A Bit of a Do starring David Jason was one I never missed and thought simply delightful full of wit and humour and, despite the sorrowful centre to this novel, the same humour is there. One friend who would love to come to the funeral, has tickets for Wimbledon one day that week and asks if possible, if the funeral could be on another day; another, a gourmet, has a long booked lunch at a posh restaurant which has a waiting list for months is reluctant to forgo that as well - having arranged my mother's funeral a year or so ago, I know that sometimes these appointments, seemingly trivial in comparison, are part of people's lives and they are reluctant to change their arrangements. David Nobbs understands this and the natural reactions are dealt with in a quiet and amusing way.
I loved It had to be You and I became very fond of James. He is pretty unsparing in his opinion of himself, his guilt at realising that now that he is free he doesn't want to be with Helen any more which makes him feel guiltier than ever, his realisation that he cannot cry for Deborah even though he gradually realises just how much he had loved and depended on her - beautifully done. So as well as making me laugh quietly while reading It had to be You, this novel also made me well up a bit as James has to come to terms with his past and present.
The lover who waits in vain for Deborah - well, who is he? He is engaged in an amusing sub-plot when he finds he has left his wedding ring in the loo at the hotel where he was to meet her and finds that the staff at the hotel have sent it to his address. Unfortunately, it was a false address and he ends up having to fly to Belfast to an office there to collect it.
"Do you have some identification on you sir?" "I certainly do" He handed the man his driving licence. "This is not the name on the package sir. You told me you had given a false address sir. I didn't realise you had given a false name as well.......rules do not permit me to give this passage to anyone other than Mr J rivers"
"Mr Rivers does not exist" "I know and therein lies the horns of our quandary sir. I've never met you before.....the criminal mind is devious. Criminals do not look like criminals.... you yourself have told me that you gave a false name and address so, with respect sir, it is proved from your own mouth that you are capable of dishonesty......there is no way that I, a simple postal employee, could risk my career, my job and perhaps the safety of my fellow citizens by handing a package to any man other than this addressee"
Brilliant.
So who is the Man in the White Linen Suit? You can try and guess - I did and I was wrong.
A rather touching and unexpected book. I loved it and will be cherishing my copy which was signed by David when I met him at the top of the Oxo Tower the other week. He was as delightful as his book.
